What’s the first thing we usually do after we’ve decided that we’re going to turn our skill in to a service to earn income?
What are the most talked about ways of “marketing” nowadays?
Social Media right?
If you use any social media websites then you know what I’m talking about. People talking about themselves day in and day out, promoting their service, showcasing their work and talking about how great they are. Matter of fact, aren’t we doing this ourselves?
Let me ask you this, how well is this social media strategy working? How well is it working for us?
Chances are that we don’t want to admit it, but it’s — not (working).
Well truth is, the problem is not that social media does not work, but rather, it’s not what you should be focusing on initially. On top of that, most people use social media promotion methods incorrectly. This leads to a bunch of time wasted, and often times massive amount of frustration and confusion!
This is one of the biggest mistake us beginning freelancers make. We try to “get out there” by throwing up a bunch of random information about ourselves and then we WAIT.
Waiting is one of the most deadliest things you can do as a beginning freelancer when you’re looking to get customers. The reason being that the chances of someone stumbling up your message and actually becoming interested enough to want to hire you and pay you – is very, very slim.
Instead, what we must do when we’re starting off is to go DIRECT.
We need to identify who are customers are, find out the benefits they’re looking for or the problem they’re looking to solve. After that, we need to approach them directly to demonstrate how we can help them.
By doing so, you cut through all the nonsense. You save days, maybe even months of time of sitting around, WAITING for people to notice you.
Going direct will also save you the effort of making a website, putting together your best portfolio, blogging or social media status updates. In reality, all these things are secondary.